The matchbook burned in my pocket all day.
Not literally. But I felt it there — an invisible pulse against my hip with every step, every glance, every silence.
Especially Theo's silence.
Petra had said nothing more since slipping it to me outside the stairwell, and she'd avoided me in the corridors since. But the message inside — that looping, precise handwriting — it didn't feel like Petra's. It felt… older. Familiar in a way I couldn't explain.
> Remember me.
It wasn't the words that haunted me.
It was the way they were written.
Like someone who once wrote poetry in the margins of her diary.
Like someone who used to be here.
Who wasn't supposed to be remembered.
---
That night, I didn't sleep.
I waited until the tower bell struck eleven, then pulled on a hoodie over my nightshirt, shoved the matchbook into my coat pocket, and left.
No one patrolled the North Wing after hours. The prefects were too lazy, or too scared.
The archives were cold when I stepped inside. Cold in a way that felt buried, not abandoned. Dust lifted like breath. Wood creaked under foot. And the entire corridor felt like it had exhaled when I crossed the threshold.
There was no reason to believe the matchbook would lead me anywhere. But something pulled me toward the east wall — the section marked "Historical Logs: Pre-1900."
Only there was nothing there.
Just old shelves, older books, and a window that didn't quite close.
Until I noticed the light.
Not from the bulb overhead — that flickered.
But from the floor.
A faint glow, slipping through the crack beneath a wooden panel.
I dropped to my knees. Ran my fingers along the molding. There — a notch. A gap.
I pried it open.
Behind the panel was a small cavity. Empty except for a single item:
A leather-bound journal with a pressed violet on the cover.
No name. No date.
Just a symbol.
And when I opened it—
There she was.
---
Anastasia Vale.
Written at the top of the very first page. And again, and again, in the margins of nearly every entry.
Beneath the name: sketches. Mirror symbols. Ritual diagrams. Bits of poetry. Pages and pages of tight cursive text, all written in a hand I somehow already knew.
I scanned the dates. Most were from three years ago. All during her final term.
And on the third page in, I found it:
> He said he would choose me. But I think he meant it like a warning, not a promise.
— A.V.
Another entry:
> They told me if I remembered too much, I'd become a threat. So I started writing it all down. If they take my mind, let them at least know they failed.
I flipped faster now, breath caught in my throat.
> Theo hasn't spoken to me since the Mirror Trial. I think it broke something in him. He still watches. He still draws. But he doesn't touch me anymore.
I froze.
Theo.
My Theo.
And farther down—
> Julian kissed me like it was the last time. I don't think he knew it was.
I stopped reading.
---
My hands were shaking.
My pulse was in my ears.
Because it wasn't just a diary.
It was a map.
A record of something the Velvet Order had tried to erase.
And somehow, both of them — Theo and Julian — had been here for it.
Both had known her.
Loved her.
Failed her.
And now, three years later…
I was in her place.
---
I tucked the journal back behind the panel, careful not to smudge the violet.
Then I ran.
Through the corridor. Past the observatory steps. Down the dormitory hall. I didn't know where I was going until I found myself at the edge of the gardens — the hidden courtyard Theo sometimes vanished into after midnight.
He was there.
Sitting on the low wall, sketchbook in hand, legs dangling over the ledge like the drop below didn't exist.
"Did you follow me?" he asked without turning.
"No," I said. "But I found her."
That made him look.
His eyes — so familiar in their stillness — flinched.
"You read it."
"She wrote about you."
He nodded, slowly. Closed the sketchbook, but didn't move.
"I didn't help her when she needed me," he said. "I watched her fall, Elena. Not metaphorically. Not emotionally. Literally. I watched her fall into the Mirror chamber. And I let the Order cover it up."
My breath caught.
"She didn't die," I whispered.
"I don't think so," he said. "But they made everyone forget her. Almost everyone. I've been drawing her for three years. Just so I wouldn't."
---
I stepped forward. Slowly. Carefully.
Theo looked like someone holding glass inside his chest.
"I'm not her," I said.
"I know."
"Then why do you look at me like I am?"
He met my gaze.
"Because I don't want to make the same mistake twice."
---
He stood then. Stepped down. Crossed the few feet between us.
And kissed me.
Not desperate.
Not demanding.
Just… real.
Like a memory being rewritten.
Like a second chance he didn't think he'd deserve.
When we broke apart, he rested his forehead against mine and whispered, "They'll come for you soon."
"Let them," I said.
"No," Theo murmured. "You have to survive this, Elena. You have to finish the story she couldn't."
---
I didn't ask what he meant.
I just stepped back and left him there — under the stars, under the ache of something neither of us could fix.
---
When I reached my dorm, Julian was waiting outside my door.
He didn't speak. Just looked at me with something fragile behind his eyes.
"Elena," he said finally.
"You knew her too," I whispered.
A beat.
Then a slow nod.
"She was the last person I lied to before I learned how to mean it."
---
I didn't invite him in.
But I didn't shut the door in his face either.
We just stood there.
Two boys.
One girl.
One name, rising again like a ghost no one had buried properly.
Anastasia Vale.
She had fallen.
And I was starting to understand that this time — I wouldn't.